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Emily Dickinson's Collected Poems

Part One: Life 48. Though I get home how late, how late!

THE RETURN.


Though I get home how late, how late!

So I get home, 't will compensate.

Better will be the ecstasy

That they have done expecting me,

When, night descending, dumb and dark,

They hear my unexpected knock.

Transporting must the moment be,

Brewed from decades of agony!


To think just how the fire will burn,

Just how long-cheated eyes will turn

To wonder what myself will say,

And what itself will say to me,

Beguiles the centuries of way!